Posts Tagged ‘Vanessa Selbst retires poker’

Vanessa Selbst has been one of the world’s top poker players for the past several years. But the 33-year-old has decided that her pro career is over.

She announced via Facebook that she’ll be walking away from the game that’s made her rich and famous.

Selbst wrote that she’s grateful for everything poker has given her over the years. But she doesn’t want to do it professionally any longer.

Selbst’s Reasons for Retiring from Poker

Here are the reasons that Selbst listed regarding her decision to quit poker:

“The most obvious reason is that Black Friday has meant that in order to do this job professionally, you either had to move out of the country or travel 90% of the time.”

“Secondly, I don’t feel good about promoting poker as an ambassador anymore (I can’t tell amateurs they should come play online and it’s beatable for them when I don’t feel like it’s true).”

“Lastly, whether because poker got more competitive or because we got older (or likely some combination of the two), poker recently turned into a real job, requiring hard work and discipline to succeed. I had never treated the game that way–I always kept a very light poker schedule–I showed up and played for fun and did other projects back home as my ‘real work.'”

What will Selbst Do Now?

One more thing that Selbst covered in her post is how she plans on helping run a hedge fund. She’s excited about the new opportunity and feels like the hedge fund is similar to poker years ago.

“There’s so much to learn and figure out in a world that’s completely new to me and every day I think I’m getting the hang of it, the next day I fail at the next challenge,” she wrote. “It’s exhausting, exciting, and completely humbling every single day.”

Selbst will still play poker for fun. But her days of grinding long hours are over.

She retires with $11,851,384 in winnings along with 3 WSOP gold bracelets.